Jackie Phantom
by Nano Phantom
Summary: I am not just another character that fan fiction writers add to the Danny Phantom series, for I am more than that. I am a person, a ghost, your hero, and your friend. Nano's NaNoWriMo 2009.
1. Summary of My Childhood

written 11/1/09_

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**Jackie Phantom**

_A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Nano_

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_Sometimes, life is too good to last._

Chapter 1

Summary of My Childhood

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When people tell of their own traumatic experiences, they often state that they do not remember them well. Either the details have slipped their minds, or it was all a vague blur. At least, this is true in stories. I truly believe that it is impossible to forget a traumatic experience that influences your entire life (omitting the ones who lose their memories). There have been many instances in my life that are extremely hard to forget. I recall the visions, the smells, the nerves, the people, and all the details and environmental structures in my surroundings. Of course, I only remember the details I experienced. For example, if all I saw was a bright, green light, then all I remember is a bright, green light. One of my experiences that I will never forget as long as I live is when I became a ghost.

As you are reading this, you probably think that I am Danny Fenton, a.k.a. worldwide known ghost-boy Danny Phantom, Vlad Masters, Danni Phantom, or even Dark Dan. You have never heard of me before, because this is the first time that I expose my story and myself to the world. After you learn about me, you will never look at ghosts the way you look upon them now. I am not just another character that fan fiction writers add to the Danny Phantom series, for I am more than that. I am a person, a ghost, your hero, and your friend.

My name is Jacklyn Peters, a.k.a. Lyn, and I'm Jackie Phantom. That last sentence is basically summarizing my entire life story. Explains the title, right?

Many people believe that I could be Danny's clone. I have jet-black hair, no highlights, and it comes down to just below my shoulder. I almost never pull it back. It is naturally wavy, but I straighten it every morning when I have the time, so my hair is usually somewhat thin, but it is not flat. I pull my bangs aside, which comes over part of my left eye. I really like my hair, because it gives me somewhat of a Goth look, but I am not Goth. I am more of a rocker or skater girl. My eyes are sky blue, and in "ghost mode", they are glowing green, just like Danny's eyes.

I live with my best friends Zinnia and Sheryl whom I have known for nearly my entire life. I am fourteen years and ten months old, and I have basically raised myself. My parents died in a plane crash when I was almost a year old. I was involved in that plane crash.

For now, I am going to explain more about me and my twisted lifestyle. I don't want to go into minute detail about the plane crash right now. Although, I want to mention that it is one of my traumatic experiences that I was talking about.

After surviving the plane crash, I was transferred to an orphanage on a road located just outside of Amity Park, USA. The orphanage is where I met Zinnia Robinson and Sheryl Lohec. I despised that place.

The orphanage was filthy, unless we orphans cleaned the place up. The woman who ran the place never paid much attention to us. She was not rude to us or anything, she just didn't give us much and never interacted with the orphans. Everyone always ran wild. The only things I owned were the undersized clothes on my back and my old stuffed bunny that my parents gave me when I was born. I still had it from the plane crash.

Zinnia and Sheryl shared rooms with me, which is how I knew them. When we were about ten years old, we followed through with an escape plan. One night, we slipped out of our dorm window and ran away as far and fast as we could. We stopped at Amity Park, which was about a twenty-minute run away. We slept in an alley that night, with nothing but rags and dirt ground on that early December evening.

The next morning, Zinnia fell down a hole at the end of the alley. She broke her leg after the fifteen feet drop. There was a long underground tunnel beneath it, and Sheryl and I carefully peaked in and checked it out. First, we had to cautiously pull Zinnia out with a nearby rope. We found and stole a ladder from the grocery store next door and dropped it down the hole. Sheryl and I climbed downward. The only light came from the opening in the ground above us. We decided to make the tunnel our shelter until we could find a better place to live. We called it the "Subhouse."

Over the next couple of years, we furnished and decorated the Subhouse with things we bought with money we earned from jobs. We even built an internal staircase and walls. We had to do _something_ all day besides work.

Zinnia received a job at the grocery store next door, while Sheryl became a paid helper at the public library. I taught myself how to play guitar, and I wrote and sung my own songs and posted them on YouTube, hoping I could find a career as a child star. Zinnia and Sheryl knew that singing was one of my hobbies, but they failed to notice that I was trying to make a job out of it. YouTube was somewhat of a secret life, but it was nothing compared to the hectic secret life I have now. _Nothing_.

Sheryl kept telling me that I sounded exactly like Miley Cyrus. I honestly did not believe her, but after listening to my recordings, I could doubt her no longer. My voice could have been Miley's voice. Nothing against Miley, but I did not want to sound exactly like an already well-known superstar. I believed it slightly lowered my chances of becoming an original singing sensation from YouTube. With my plain looks, good singing and guitar playing were the only opportunities I had of becoming famous. Anyway, just listen to any Miley Cyrus song and pretend it's me singing. If it were me, you wouldn't know the difference. I think it's extremely weird.

All three of us attended Casper Junior High School as soon as we were old enough. I was in sixth grade when I met my future all-time best friend Verona Vitale. Verona had black, shoulder length hair and hazel eyes, and she was a half-inch shorter than me. She's my height now. She had a smaller figure than me, she was obsessed with skateboarding, and she liked wearing T-shirts, long jeans, and hats. Verona was an all-around tomboy.

That year, I also met Danny Fenton. My sense of direction was so horrible that our homeroom teacher assigned him to be my school guide since he apparently knew the building inside and out, and we were friends after that. Through his connections, I met Tucker Foley and Sam Manson. I liked Sam a lot. She was happy to know a girl, besides Verona, that wasn't all girly and popular. She didn't like seeing me with Danny, though. She always cringed when Danny talked to me. The connection was so obvious.

Verona started coming over to the Subhouse a lot. She said that she disliked having to babysit her younger brother and baby sister all the time. If you had not known better, you would have thought that she lived at the Subhouse with us. Verona and I did homework together every day after school, and we even shared the exact same iTunes library. Yeah, we were close.

Then, all of us happily attended Casper High School. Zinnia, Sheryl, Verona and I were still the closest of friends, especially me and Verona. We did homework, hung out, crushed on boys, all of that. If it had kept up, I would have grown up looking back at all of the normal, happy high school memories. Although Amity Park had a ghost infestation problem, it did not really bother me. Ghosts just made our lives more special. Besides, the only times I ever saw them were on the news. They were too distant to worry about. Danny Phantom always took care of them and trapped them in his "trapping gadget", at least that is what Verona called it.

One day, Danny told me that he was having trouble with algebra homework, and since I was considered best in math, he asked me to tutor him. He told me that he didn't want his sister Jazz to help him because he never understood what she was talking about, and that she would keep saying that it's a "relatively simple procedure." He always had something to say that would make me laugh, and his eyes would sparkle…

Stop it, Lyn, stop it!

Anyway, he asked me to start tutoring him that evening. I agreed since I had nothing better to do after school. I arrived at his house around 5:00 just before dinnertime. Nobody was home, so instead of leaving right away, I decided to wonder around the house. After passing the kitchen, I drifted into the official Fenton Works lab. It was the beginning of one of the most traumatic experiences of my life.

Strong, metal tables lined the walls of the room, only spacing out for electrical outlets. Ghost hunting equipment, charts, a computer, writing utensils, and additional papers and data covered the tables' surfaces, leaving the stained floor in the middle as the only free space in the area. The carpeted walls, deeming Danny's parents' unusual way of decorating, were caressed with thin blue and black stripes, matching the solid black wood floor. The high-rise black ceiling was covered with black dirt.

I walked over to the giant hole in the wall, obviously some sort of experiment that the Fentons were working on. I saw three hazmat suits hanging on the wall beside it, all one size. The hole in the wall clearly was meant to be a walk-in closet or something of the sort.

Being my curious self, I slipped one of the suits over my clothes and walked in. The overbearing light from the lab flooded into the dark tunnel. I pressed the large red button on the wall, which read the word "On", and a bright green light started progressing from the end of the tunnel.

Worst mistake of my life.

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_This is my NaNoWriMo 2009. I kept debating on whether to post this here now or wait until I've finished and edited it, but I decided to post it now and wait for tips from readers. You're very lucky._

_Jacklyn is a character that I have been developing for months. I honestly hope that she can be carried on further than just this one story. I'm not going to tell you any details for now. First of all, it would spoil the story, and second, I haven't come up with the details yet. I will post more about Jackie Phantom on my profile. Feel free to PM me with any questions or requests._

_I will be posting a chapter every day, each one unedited. I'm trusting you to help me edit it. I'm not good at correcting my own mistakes. Also, I really want to know if the whole "Miley Cyrus' voice" thing is too cheesy, because I've always imagined Lyn with her voice._

_That's all for now, please let me know what you think. Thanks!_

_~Nano_


	2. The Crash

written 11/6/09**

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**Jackie Phantom**

_A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Nano_

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_Sometimes, abrupt moments last forever._

Chapter II

The Crash

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The last chapter sums up my life as a pure human being. I kept mentioning that I happily attended school and hung out with friends as any preteen would. It was a great time in my life because I was finally living a life outside of the orphanage, and I am glad I enjoyed it while it lasted. No powers, no responsibilities, no ghostly enemies, and plenty of free time. I feel like I would trade anything to have it back.

There are a few advantages to being a ghost, though. First of all, superpowers are superpowers. I especially love being able to fly. When life stresses me out, I can just escape and fly as high as I can into the cloudy sky. If I am high enough, I can only see the stratus clouds below me, the horrors of the human world are out of sight, and I like to pretend that they never existed. Sometimes, I even bring my guitar with me, and I float on my back while I play it lying across my stomach. I literally feel like I am floating in heaven.

Heaven seems to be a place so far away, but what if it is right here in the clouds? If every person that dies, every spirit that rises, spends his or her afterlife "haunting" the sky, and every tortured soul is doomed to haunting the Earth. I guess it's a main part in being a half-human, half-ghost hybrid. My home residence is on Earth, but I am able to go and fly among heaven's clouds. To me, it all makes sense.

Maybe I fly with my parents every day. Since they're "fully dead", they just appear permanently invisible and they exist as light, feathery spirits within the clouds. Maybe they know my secret, and they fly along with me. That would be wonderful, but I would still like to know for sure.

For now, I want to go more in depth about my early childhood. I believe that the fatal plane crash that killed my parents brings me to where I am today, here in my bed writing this story in my spiral notebook about being a ghost. Not many people can live and tell their tales of being a ghost.

This is my story of the crash:

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People rushed in and out of the hectic airport, all hastening to go on summer vacations and such. I was just under a year old. Our neighbor dropped me and my parents off at the front entrance, which was difficult considering all the luggage we had, including a stroller and a diaper bag, since I was not potty trained yet.

My mom had long, wavy thick black hair, just like mine, except I do not like to keep it that way. I remember that her first name was Miranda, since my dad was always calling her by her first name. I think my dad's name started with a "J", but I cannot tell for sure.

My parents adored me. I was their only child, and they loved giving me things. My favorite toy was my white stuffed bunny rabbit I named Fluffy, and I still have it. It was the only thing that I brought back from the orphanage.

The inside of the airport was dimly lit, since it was about 3 o'clock in the morning, and there were not many people there. Despite the pleasant atmosphere, I was terrified. My fear of airplanes was the only reason I remembered the moments up to the crash.

We went through all of the airport procedures and continued to our waiting area. My dad held me on his lap, and my mom sat next to him. I tried not to cry. My mom leaned over to me, the future flying sensation, and whispered in my ear, "Todo estará bien, sólo es un avión."

"It'll be okay, it's only an airplane." I will never fail to remember those tragic untruthful words, the last words my mom said to me.

A few minutes later, while my mom sat in a plastic chair and held me on her lap with my arms wrapped around her, I spotted a strange person staring at me from across the crowded airport hallway. A woman. She wore a long white dress, almost like a wedding dress excluding the vale. She had musty-colored grey hair that came down to her waist, like a sheet of shining dirty carpet draping down from her head. It was more wavy than curly, though. Some sort of aura surrounded her, and her eyes were a bright green. Not just normal human green eyes, but a _glowing _green. Staring at _me._

As terrified as I was of boarding the plane, it was definitely a match compared to the strange woman. If looks could kill, I would have exploded. After staring back for a while, I noticed that her musty grey hair had thick, long white streaks in it. It was very inhuman. Suddenly, just as soon as I had noticed her, a person walked by in front of her, and the next moment she was gone. That was strange.

We boarded the plane that was scheduled to arrive in a city across the Atlantic Ocean, along with about ten other people. I momentarily forgot about the airplane and kept thinking about the odd ethereal woman. I soon stopped thinking about her, though. My airplane fears crept back as we kept moving forward with the line until we were seated inside the plane. My mom sat in the window seat with her arms wrapped tightly around me. My dad sat beside us.

My mom did not say anything to me, since she did not want to upset me anymore that I already was. As I said, she had already spoken her last words to me. I lay on my side against her chest, buried my head in her long muffled black hair, and I fell asleep.

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A sudden jolt of the plane shook me awake. The plane felt like it had stopped abruptly in the air, somewhat like a car suddenly putting on the breaks at a stoplight. The yellow air masks popped out of the ceiling, and one of the masks hit my dad on the head. Normally it would have been humorous, but I was frightened out of my wits. The overwhelming adrenaline flooded through my body as everyone in the plane started to panic. I knew something went seriously wrong. I couldn't think, I couldn't cry, I couldn't go into shock. I did what a baby knew how to do – I screamed.

Apparently, nobody was paying the slightest attention to me. Everybody frantically put on the yellow masks, and my mom attempted putting a mask on my face. My mom was wearing one, and I could tell the situation just by looking into her eyes. Her eyes were blood red, and intense wrinkles crawled up her forehead with her eyebrows. She was crying. She was crying because she was frightened with her life, because she was frightened for me.

All this happened within just a few seconds of waking up from my nap, and I soon realized that it was still dark outside, so it was still rather early in the morning. All the commotion took place because the plane stopped, the engines died down, and the oxygen masks dropped down from the ceiling. Imagine what happened when the plane started to drop from the sky.

Every person on the plane frantically grabbed the floatation devices off their seats, and I bet more than half of the passengers looked back at the directions to see how to work them. My mom had abandoned putting the oxygen mask on me, and everyone was running around and panicking. My mom held me tightly, and I wrapped my arms around her as tight as I could. I had every right to be afraid of airplanes.

The airplane kept falling and falling. Of course, I had no idea what was going on, but I eventually worked out the details, which is why I am writing about it now. Everyone appeared terrified, and my mom and dad held on to the seats for dear life, while my mom had one arm wrapped tightly around me. As soon as it had started, everything stopped moving, and I fell unconscious.

I woke up lying on a seat cushion in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

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_Sorry I didn't post this on time. I promised to write a chapter and post it every day, but that isn't exactly working out. I'm just going to write the chapters when I have time and post them as soon as I can. Overall, I WILL finish 50,000 words by November 30._

_First of all, only 2 reviews? Keep in mind that I am basing this whole novel on the reviews I get, and I will be editing this when I'm finished. I can't edit it well if I don't have people's opinions to work with. Trust me, once this is finished and edited, it will be 110% better. Thank you_ _xXPeaceBabesXx and Jaylein-Skyler for reviewing, and for those that added this to your alert or favorites lists. I had 42 hits, 42 visitors, and I expect at least half that number in reviews._

_Anyway, check out my profile. I re-edited it, so it's somewhat better than before, but it's still not finished. Thanks!_

_~Nano_


	3. The Orphanage

written 11/16/09

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Jackie Phantom

_A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Nano_

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_Perfect usually fails to be perfect._

Chapter 3

The Orphanage

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_**October 2004 **_

"Geet up!"

No, not now. Not today.

"Geet up, geet up NOW!"

The keeper of the orphanage, Ms. A l'aide, marched into the bedroom and pulled the covers off our beds. I immediately felt the cold air from outside, and I shivered. Up north, October never had pleasant weather. By the time I rose out of bed, the harsh woman had also forced my roommates, Zinnia and Sheryl, out of their beds, if you could call them beds.

Ms. A l'aide, seeing that we were awake and standing, smirked and left the room without another word. She only manhandled the older orphans, so I was considered lucky for how I was treated. The usual morning routine was nothing new to me, because that was how Ms. A l'aide usually woke us up.

I especially did not want to wake up that particular morning because a health inspector was coming that afternoon, and we orphans were required to do extra chores that day. Ms. A l'aide assigned my roommates and me to the roof committee, since we were young, small, and less likely to struggle on the orphanage's roof. I hated cleaning. Today, I do not mind cleaning in general, but cleaning for someone I hated with no payment exceeded my limits. In addition, the roof had no railing whatsoever, and it was a seven-story building. That proves how much Ms. A l'aide cared about us.

Ms. A l'aide was not especially cruel compared to the orphanage keeper stereotype, but she still seemed harsh, unpleasant and nasty. Clothing of animal furs covered her body most of the time, along with plenty of jewelry to make us drool. She especially favored leopard prints with pearl necklaces. Despite what you are thinking, she was not especially ugly, and she was not fat. She dressed up a great deal, and there was nothing wrong with that. She could have been less arrogant about it, though.

I looked up A l'aide on the Internet once. Apparently, A l'aide is French for the word "help". I guess it fits into the story somehow…

She never did remember my name. Well, she knew my name, but she failed to call me by the name everyone entitled me, Lyn. She called me Jacklyn, mostly Jackie. I disliked that name, and I still do. I go by "Jackie Phantom" because it was the only identity for my ghost half I could come up with. Verona actually gave me the idea. Anyway, Ms. A l'aide called me Jacklyn because it was written on my contract, and she never stuck around to hear the orphans call me Lyn. It was one of my biggest pet peeves at the time.

I was nine years old, turning ten in November. I had been at the orphanage ever since after the plane crash in 1995. I'm turning fifteen years old this month, in 2009. I really should stop talking about ages.

Ms. A l'aide left the room. The three of us glanced at each other, not saying a word. There had never been many awkward silences quite like that one. Ms. A l'aide leaves the room without so much as an insult? The suspense was almost as worse as the insults themselves.

Slowly and grudgingly, I drifted over to the single dresser in the room, pulled out my cotton jacket from the drawer second from the bottom, and picked up my brown sandals from next to the wall behind the dresser. Zinnia and Sheryl did the same. We slipped our jackets on over our clothes – considering that we wore the same clothes for night and day – and put on our shoes.

"What committee are y'all on?" Sheryl asked the two of us as she struggled into a shoe that was obviously too small for her foot.

"All of us are on the committee that cleans the roof," admitted Zinnia, who was ready first, "I want to get downstairs soon before all of the new washrags are taken."

"New washrags?"

"Yes, someone donated them."

"Sweet, at least there's someone out there who cares about this dump in this God-forsaken place."

"Sher, what happened to your arm?" Zinnia sounded panicky, so I looked up from the floor that I was staring at while listening to their conversation.

A long gash cut deep into Sheryl's black skin, which started at her elbow and progressed to her shoulder, twisting around her upper arm. It looked like it had been bleeding, but it was clotted up. It could easily have been vulnerable to a nasty infection. It obviously happened within the last couple of days.

"Oh, that's just a birthmark," Sheryl instantly stretched her sleeve over it, her face reflecting on how stupid her answer sounded.

I stepped in, "Sheryl, that is _not _a birthmark."

"I also agree," Zinnia stated. She always did her best to sound prim and proper, and it made me sick. Of course, I never mentioned that to her, since I was too timid. I _still _have failed to mention it to her.

Since we brought it up, Sheryl began to scratch her arm like crazy. The area she was scratching began to bleed.

"Ew, gross! Stop that Sheryl," Zinnia said, completely disgusted. I tried not to laugh at the sight – it was so funny.

Sheryl stopped scratching and looked up, "Fine, I'll tell you. It's not like some huge secret, anyway," she picked up her abandoned sandal and started playing with it, "Last night, I tried finding a secret passage or something that led out of the building."

"You what!?"

"Shut up, Zinnia," Sheryl continued her story, while I paid close attention, "It was dark, and I couldn't find a flashlight in Ms. A l'aide's office, so I had to feel around to get anywhere. I went upstairs to the sixth floor, where the oldest kids are, and I opened some random door that looked useless. I went inside, but I stepped on something, and a bunch of tools and supplies fell on top of me. I'm not sure what cut me, though. Could've been a paper cutter by the looks of it."

"So what happened, were you seriously hurt?" I asked her.

"Let me finish. The crashing was so loud, so I panicked and ran as fast as I could down the hallway, which wasn't very fast considering it was pitch black. I think I heard Ms. A l'aide shouting after me, but I wasn't paying close enough attention to understand her. It took about fifteen minutes to find our room."

"Did you find anything, like tunnels?"

"Who _cares _if she finds anything," Zinnia butted in, "She broke out of her bedroom at night, which should be illegal. She trashed a perfectly good closet that Ms. A l'aide will notice at some point. She woke up Ms. A l'aide, which will sure spread rumors around the orphanage. And, most importantly, she was out trying to escape in the first place!"

Sheryl held up her fist and shook it as an orphan stereotype would, "Look tomato head. I wouldn't risk getting punished, possibly losing my freedom, if it ain't worth it. I'm sick of living a life of dirt and neglect for the past many years. I don't know about you, but I want to see what other breakfasts there are besides grits, _cold _grits. I've watched television before, and I know there's another life that I could be living right now, if you could call this a life. After all this time, I was expecting you to feel the same way!"

Sheryl, who had stood up in spite of her outrage, plopped down on the bed behind her. She closed her eyes and took deep breaths, in and out, as if she had run an Olympian marathon. She looked so _furious, _and it seemed that she had waited forever to spill that out to someone.

Everything was quiet for a few long seconds. Zinnia looked devastated, defeated. She opened her mouth a couple of times to say something, but nothing came out. Finally, she spoke something to break the silence, barely a whisper, "Don't say "ain't."

Surprisingly, Sheryl didn't reply to the unnecessary comment. Instead, she grabbed her brown sandals from the floor, stood up from the bed, slowly glided toward the door, and left the bedroom. Nothing left an expression on her cold face.

Intrusion was the last option for me, "So, um…"

"Forget it, Lyn," Zinnia turned away, and then glanced down at the floor. She crossed her arms while staring at her medium-length dirty fingernails. After making her clear decision, she left the room, carefully making sure she went the opposite direction down the hallway then Sheryl had gone.

_The princess and the pauper,_ I thought. _Best friends, mortal enemies. Situated within the confinement of a friendship triangle. I guess every story deserves a different plot, different characters. This is my story, my dream, my nightmare. The story of my life._

I decided to stay in the room for a while and think. Why couldn't they just get along? Strengths, weaknesses, faults – it's all part of human life. If they could only accept that, the facts that they exist as two different people with different opinions. They shared practically the same background, why were they so different from one another, so opposite?

I wanted to get out of there. The deepest desire of my heart was to leave that place and never come back, to escape the chaos and confusion. I would be happier – _we _would be happier – and we would have much better luck at great, outstanding futures. I dreamed of it every night, dreamed of possible opportunities in the upcoming. All I could think of was to get out of that dreadful orphanage. I had a basic checklist for things to do before I died: Escape the orphanage with Zinnia and Sheryl, live happily ever after, and die.

I sat on the lumpy bed, thinking of the poetic rhymes constantly passing by in my head. I set my arms in my lap and glared down at them, picking at my fingernails. I looked at my hard, used hands. My hands…

"Jackie!"

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_Thank you all so much for the reviews, favs, and alerts. I would post your names, but I'm just too tired. Maybe later, sorry._

_Next chapter will most likely be the escape. I'm going to try and write this faster so I can get it done by the end of the month. Encouragement is greatly appreciated :)._

_I'm not asking for reviews anymore, mostly because it doesn't make a difference, so I'm just going to post my stories and let you decide whether to review or not. Keep in mind that I don't write for fun, I write for other people's opinions. It's just the way I work._

_That's it for now. Thanks a bunch!_

_~Nano_


	4. The Omen

written 11/25/09

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Jackie Phantom

_A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Nano_

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_Maybe is always an answer._

Chapter 4

The Omen

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"Jackie!"

The sound of the orphanage keeper's voice rattled in my head, blocking out any of my thoughts. I looked down and noticed that there were no shoes on my feet, and the floor was filled with all of our stuff. Our beds lay unmade, and some of the sheets spread over the post. The room was a mess, and Ms. A l'aide would be furious if she saw it.

Apparently, she saw it.

Ms. A l'aide stood in the doorway with her mouth gaping open, her hand over her chest, "Jackie, what on Earth…!"

"Oh, I'm s-sorry, Ms. A l'aide," I immediately shot up from the bed and started grabbing the first things I could reach, "I'll clean it up. Zinnia and Sheryl got into another fight, and I kind of forgot about the room. I'm so sorry it's such a mess in here. I'll clean it up before duty, I promise." I hoped that I had given a good answer. After all, it was the truth.

"Sure, brat," the wicked woman replied, glancing around at the rest of the room, "You better. I have never seen anything quite as ghastly as this, darn it. And it's _Madame _A l'aide, don't you forget that."

"Excuse me, but you don't exactly call me by my preferred name, either."

"Shut your trap, hoodlum, and don't talk back to me," she tensely stated," I want this place cleaned up and you at breakfast at six o'clock sharp." She took a quick look at the wall clock, "That's fifteen minutes."

"Yes, mam."

Ms. A l'aide (excuse me, _Madame _A l'aide) gave one more snotty, hateful look at me right before she left the room. After hearing that witch yell at me so much with her French accent, I think I will never be able to hear another French accent without hinting a bit of evil in it.

Ms. A l'aide seemed to dislike the younger orphans more than the older ones, since we went a bit crazy sometimes. She especially hated the stubborn ones. Young plus stubborn equaled me. I had a very…_special _reputation for being the most stubborn and rudest to Ms. A l'aide among all the juvenile delinquents. Sheryl came in as a close second.

I grabbed a pile of clothes off the floor and stuffed it into a dresser drawer. Stashing was my method of cleaning back then. I finished cleaning at five minutes until six, and I ran down the stairs to the dining room quickly.

Four long tables were set up, each end touching the walls opposite one another. Each table seated eighteen, making the total occupancy 72. The orphanage held 60 children. Old country white tablecloths covered each table, and a single jack-o-lantern sat in the middle of each one. It was likely that the jack-o-lanterns would stay through November, since we typically kept holiday decorations up until the next holiday, Halloween going on Thanksgiving in that case.

Zinnia sat with some friends at the end of the table farthest from the entrance where I stood. Sheryl sat near the middle of the table next to that one, completely alone, with not one person sitting beside her through to the ends. I drifted over to her table, where there was a cold bowl of grits waiting for me in the place next to Sheryl.

"Are you okay?" I asked the clearly depressed girl hanging her head over her grits.

Sheryl stopped twirling her spoon on the edge of her bowl and looked up at me.

"Sorry, standard question."

"I'm fine, I guess," Sheryl whispered, looking back down at her rotten breakfast, "Not any worse than usual. I'm just so surprised that Zinnia doesn't care about busting out of here, at least as much as I do."

"Maybe she's just afraid to admit it."

"Why would she be?"

"I don't know, I'm not a mind reader. That's just my best guess."

"Well, the chances of her keeping something to herself are smaller than me inventing a time machine in the next five minutes. Even if she is afraid to admit it, she doesn't have to be so rude about it."

"I think you're being just as bad as her, Sheryl."

"Lyn, don't help."

"Good idea."

The two of us sat in silence for the next fifteen minutes while other kids started sitting down around us. I decided to pass on breakfast and pretend I was out of the mood for being hungry. Hopefully there would be something better for lunch. I watched Zinnia and her girlish clique get up from their table and walk out of the room while they visited. I knew Zinnia did not particularly care about those girls, she just wanted to stay away from Sheryl, possibly me, for the time being.

I left the table once Sheryl was "finished" and tossed my bowl into the single trashcan. Passing the lobby and a couple of rooms, we gathered a few supplies necessary from a utensil closet and ascended numerous flights of stairs until we reached our destination – the roof. _Don't be filthy, don't be filthy. _The thoughts crept back into my head again, haunting the most sensitive parts of my brain, purposely torturing it with the many fears I contemplated. Heights, dirt, dealing with Zinnia and Sheryl's ramblings, just to name a few.

My arms piled high with new washrags, liquid soap, dusting liquid for wood, hard-surface cleaners, and baby wipes. Sheryl had grabbed a broom and dustpan from the closet and had refused to carry anything else because "her hands were full". Yes, she could be so thoughtful.

I carefully stepped out onto the roof, making sure I missed the squeaky shingles that could easily fall off or fall through the ceiling. The ground beneath me just seemed so _thin_, and I knew there was nothing safe about it. It was the airplane incident all over again. A small structure similar to an outhouse stood in the center of the area near the back of the building, and it held a small door leading to a staircase within it.

I found Zinnia and a couple of boys sitting at the right edge of the roof. Luckily, the roof was flat and lacked any inclines, so the chances of falling off the roof by slipping were slim. Someone could easily fall off by standing at the edge, though.

I decided not to comment on their dangerous actions, so I decided to start cleaning to keep my mind off it. I got down on the ground near the "outhouse" on my hands and knees and started scrubbing with a washrag and soap.

"Lyn, come here!" one of the boys called to me. He had curly red hair and many freckles, and he reminded everyone of an especially tall leprechaun.

_Great, he wants me at the edge. _"What do you want, Nick?"

"Just come here, there's something really cool we need to show you."

I motioned to Sheryl, who had heard everything, just in case I needed assistance with anything. I walked over slowly, watching the ground, and held on to Zinnia as I peered over the edge. There was a large torch standing on its own on the ground below. No, floating. It was a _floating _torch.

The strange woman was standing next to it. Staring up at me.

"No, wait…" I babbled, still holding on to Zinnia for dear life, "Who is that?"

"There's no one down there," said Zinnia, struggling to balance herself with my weight pulling her to the side, "It's a…ow…sparkling piece of metal, see it?"

"No, I see a glowing white lady with a torch."

Everyone else stared me as if I were crazy. Maybe I was crazy. To see a shiny piece of metal and mistake it for a woman and a floating torch did seem bizarre. The woman looked slightly different since the last time I had seen her at the airport. She had the same white, slightly green aura, but her hair seemed to flow in the wind like feathers, and she glowed just enough to be seen from the roof. Her dress reached below her feet, which came about a yard from the ground.

Maybe she existed, maybe she didn't. I realized as soon as everyone looked at me that I was the only one who could see her. And maybe I was the only one she could see.

Maybe. Everything always has to start with _maybe._ In my confuzzled world, maybe seems to be the answer to all of life's problems. The only answer that is always correct.

"Lyn, that's not a lady. Or a torch, for that matter. That's a shiny piece of metal. M-E-T-A-L," Zinnia gasped out the last part and I squeezed onto her tighter.

"I'm not stupid, _Zinny_. I know that's metal, I was just being sarcastic. Oooo, pretty shiny thing." _Geesh, girls and shiny things._

"Whatever, and don't. Call. Me. _Zinny._" said my walking totem pole, "GET OFF OF ME!!!"

I immediately jumped back, finding that my back foot failed to touch anything. I was leaning backward, and before I could grab onto something, I fell backwards over the edge of the seven-story building. I was falling, falling to my death. Maybe.

I screamed, knowing it wouldn't do me any good. It seemed that the worst things happened to me when the white lady was around - that I have discovered with experience. She was an omen, I knew it. Maybe she was an omen of danger, of death. I reached out with my hands for my last desperate attempt for help, perhaps the wall or a pole, but of course, it was no use.

_God, _I thought for my supposed last words, "_I don't deserve this. Please please please don't do this to me. I'm so sorry for being so bad, so afraid of everything, trying to escape. I'm so sorry, God, don't do this to me. Please!"_

I screamed incessantly, straggling in the air for anything to cease my freefall. _What did I do to deserve this?_

My screaming was halted when I suddenly started to levitate in the air, just above the concrete ground of death.

* * *

_I know this isn't very well written so far, considering that one of my major pet peeves is one-line paragraphs one after the other. I'm just in a hurry since I need to write more than 40,000 words for NaNoWriMo by next Tuesday. Yes, no pressure there. *note sarcasm*_

_Thank you Jaylein-Skyler and xXPeaceBabesXx for reviewing. You're the best!_

_~Nano_


	5. The White Lady

written 11/26/09

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Jackie Phantom

_A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Nano_

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_

_There is nothing quite like a fallen angel, maybe._

Chapter 5

The White Lady

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I levitated off the ground while I closed my eyes and huddled into a ball. The world was spinning, and it felt like a rubber band projecting from the sky was holding me. As I had come to a sudden halt, I had automatically held onto my head contemplating the immediate dizziness. How did I stop falling?

I slowly opened my eyes and gazed around at my surroundings. I was down in the alley floating about a foot above the hard concrete ground, and the suspense that I could suddenly fall and crack my head open – the thought had not left me yet. I carefully moved my arms to pull my thick black hair out of my face, which had left its low ponytail and was now hanging down around my head. I spit some hair out of my mouth.

As I looked down (up geologically), I spotted the strange woman looking at me as she floated above the ground with ease. Her eyes had left their green shade and were replaced with a glowing blue color, drowning out her pupils and whites of her eyes. The torch was gone, to my surprise. My immediate thought was that the strange woman was causing me to levitate like that.

There were so many things I wanted to ask her, so many things I was curious about. Who was she? Why was I the only one who could see her, and why was she stalking me? Why was I _floating?_

I stayed speechless for about ten seconds, waiting for her to say something as our eyes met. She seemed to be waiting for me to speak, so I finally came up with a question, which was one of the most useless questions I could come up with at the moment, "What are you?"

"None of thou concern in the mean time, dear. I am merely thou protector, keeper of thou past, present, and future. I control the numerous aspects thou hath chosen upon your life. I am authoritative among all paranormal figures, which brings me to thee. I hath come to watch thee as thou grow old, so thou beith a noble phantom."

I was speechless. What did she mean a noble phantom? Phantom, wait…ghost? She was a _ghost? _

Was I dead?

"I hath said too much already," the woman continued, "This is indeed ominous jeopardy if I tell thou what awaits. Thou levitates for the sake of me. Thou art not deceased, nor art thou about to die. If thou wonders how I know what goes on in the mind of thou, I am able to read and control the minds of others. Thou not need say anything, for I have basically told thou everything there is to know, and much more there is to come, yes. In the upcoming, you may call me differently by the name I hath been given, but in this present you may call me the White Lady, my proper name."

"So, I'm not dead?"

The White Lady, with a shake of her hand, flipped me over and set me down on the ground. Her eyes suddenly stopped glowing and returned to their green hue, which was much more comfortable to face. I looked up at her tall figure as she looked back at me. She looked at me as if she were a caring mother worried for her daughter, which was odd considering I had barely said ten words to her, ever.

"No, thou art not dead. I have merely set time frozen in the moment, so I can say to thou what I should say, since thee mind haunts with the memory of me. Look above, and know what I mean by this."

I followed her instruction almost involuntarily and looked up at my friends who were peering over the edge of the roof, looking down with terror featured on their faces. Most of the arms were reaching over the side, attempting to reach out to me without use. They were frozen in motion like a photograph.

"What's going on, White Lady?" I turned back to my partner, "What are you doing, and what are you doing this for? I'm not totally understanding the 'thou art' and all that nonsense. If this is a prophecy or something, could you, like, write it down for me?"

"Thou art young, I understand. Perhaps it be taken at best that thou art not understanding."

"But I _want _to understand. How come I seem to be the only one who can see you? I'm not special in any way, I can tell you that for sure. Jacklyn Peters isn't exactly a famous name that should be feared or anything that deserves a 'protector'. How do you exist in the first place?! You must be a ghost, if you talk about me being some noble phantom, which I _know _means ghost. I'm sorry, but for now I just want you to stay away from me. I'm not cut out for any of this 'paranormal' stuff."

By then I had backed up against the wall of the orphanage building, clearly out of breath. I failed in bothering to mess with my hair, which covered most of my face and caused me to see barely anything. I thought about everything I had said - maybe I shouldn't have shouted like that. She was obviously important, considering that she had stated what an authoritative figure she was where she came from.

"Thou art thankful to someone who hath saved thee life."

Words failed to escape my mouth, and my mind was silent. My mouth slightly gaped open.

"Thou shalt see the looks of me again. Thou not plead guilty, for thou art unintelligent and doth not realize thou actions. I bid thee farewell."

A sudden rush of wind flowed past, taking the White Lady and the movement of time with it. The wind picked me up, much to my dismay, and flew me back to the roof of the orphanage. I found that I was standing next to Zinnia in my original spot before I had fallen. As soon as the unnatural wind faded away, my friends moved again, contemplating the shiny piece of metal.

"Lyn, don't you think that's awesome?" the boy named Nick said to me.

The shock of the experience was still catching up to me, the end of it ceasing to draw to an end. I looked up at Nick and merely nodded my head.

"Gosh, you could at least pretend to look impressed since I dragged you all the way over here," he said sarcastically, "You can go happily skip over there and clean up now."

Still in shock, I involuntarily turned around and headed back to the pile of cleaning supplies without a word. I had never fallen. The strange woman, the White Lady, had rewound time, and she let me remember everything.

_I never fell, _I thought over repeatedly, still stunned from the windblown realization. _I never fell, I'm not dead. I never fell._

She had said that I would see her again. When, when would I see her again? Maybe she meant that I would see her when I turned into a ghost when I died. Maybe much sooner. That's probably why I was so special, because I could see ghosts.

Of course, there would be more ghosts than just her. If I could see ghosts, then why was the White Lady the only one I could see? Maybe she was a good ghost since she considered herself white. Maybe all the other ghosts were black, and I couldn't see them. Demons. That was it. I could see ghosts, also known as _angels_, and I couldn't see demons.

Why was I so special, that I could see angels?

She did look like an angel without wings, by her looks and behavior. She had worn a long white dress, and her hair was long, white and flowing like a white sheet underwater. Her bare feet never touched the ground, yet she didn't have wings.

An angel without wings, so she was a fallen angel. That's why I could see her.

However, why was I the only one?

"Lyn," Sheryl walked over to me, kneeled down to my level and put her hand on my shoulder, "What's wrong? You look a mess - more than usual, I must add - and you haven't said one complaint in over two hours."

Breaking out of my deep contemplation, I faintly chuckled, "I'm fine. It's just the cleaning, that's all."

"Okay, well Ms. A l'aide told us that lunch starts at ten, so we have less than an hour to finish the roof before the health inspectors get here, and we ain't got enough time," she looked down at my work, "I think this one spot is clean enough."

I looked over at the spot I had been rubbing with a washrag for the last half hour, "Oh, yeah. You can never be too clean, I guess."

Sheryl stood up and left me alone with my odd deliberations. I continued cleaning the 'outhouse', for lack of a better term, for the rest of the hour. I tried to forget about the fall, the White Lady and the torch. What was that torch about, anyway?

My thoughts followed me as we walked downstairs to lunch at ten.

* * *

_I stayed up until 1 writing this chapter for you (and NaNoWriMo, which I have to finish by Monday DX). Please review. Don't make me get down on the ground and pull your leg to beg you, because I will. Trust me._

_I will say this again - this is the unedited first version of this story. I plan on rewriting it and making it a whole lot longer, but for now I'm posting it just to get tips on how to fix it. Your critique and advice is accepted 100%._

_Thanks a bunch!_

_~Nano_


	6. The Escape

written 12/30/2009

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Jackie Phantom

_A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Nano_

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_Sometimes, things just fall into place._

Chapter 6

The Escape

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"Zinnia, hurry up!"

"Sheryl, slow down!"

"Both of you, shut up!"

The three of us wondered down a pitch-dark hallway with a single flashlight from Ms. A l'aide's office. Sheryl finally agreed to show us a few secret tunnels she had discovered the night before, and Zinnia unwillingly tagged along. I had had to put up with the bickering of those two for the past half hour, and knowing how much longer I would be able to take it was beyond me.

I sauntered along right next to the wall, scratching my dirty, chipped fingernail between the cracks as I passed by. We failed to find anything up to that moment, and Sheryl was currently in the lead. The night was closing, and midnight approached. We were nearing the outskirts of the building, and the chill of the outside air was finally creeping in, swallowing us whole. Zinnia grew cold easily considering how pale and fragile her skin seemed. I resisted the urge to hug her tight to keep her from shivering drastically.

The main hallway on the highest floor stretched from one wall to the opposite, being so wide as to take up half the floor. Pillars situated in the middle of the hallway, splitting it into two columns. The walls seemed like they were made up of fake beige bricks, but in the shadows they looked black and eerie, similar to those of a haunted house. One paned glass window featuring the solar system was embedded in the ending wall, shining with the lights from the streetlamps outside. Just around the corner of the opposite ending wall was Ms. A l'aide's office, with her bedroom being right next to it, and the two rooms conjoined to make one large suite. Orphans never entered the mistress' ward, not even to clean up. It was just our luck that Ms. A l'aide's suite was situated on the same floor with this "secret tunnel" Sheryl kept mentioning.

The width of the building was causing our search for the tunnel to draw out to an intimate length of time, and I mentally cursed Sheryl's memory for forgetting the tunnel's location. My feet were starting to freeze from the lack of warmth and the draftiness of my shoes. I stuffed my bare hands within my inside jacket pockets to keep from getting frostbite. If I could have received what I wanted for Christmas, I would have at least asked for a pair of thick, soft gloves.

"Sheryl, I'm cold. Can we _please_ go back?"

"Hold on, Lyn. I know this wall."

I ran up to her with my exceedingly numb legs and grabbed her shoulder, bringing her to a stop and causing her to look at me, "Sheryl, I'm _freezing."_

"Sheryl, Sheryl, Sheryl, Sheryl. Okay, I get it!"

"_Sheryl, _you are so hopeless," I stated, pushing her shoulder aside.

"Ow!"

"_Please_ shut it, both of you!" Zinnia said as she raced past and nudged both of us, "If we have wasted this much valuable time searching for a nonexistent secret passage, I do not want to turn around now. Just pretend you're too tired to fight."

"Speak for yourself, tomato head." Sheryl smirked.

"Shut up."

"Oooo, the princess said 'shut up'."

Zinnia snatched the flashlight out of Sheryl's right hand, staring her in the face, "I've had enough of this. We are going to find this tunnel before I freeze to death if I have to do it myself! This place is just too spooky for me to handle," Zinnia backed away and looked around, "Besides, there really is no proof that ghost don't exist."

The memory was back. I winced.

"Come on, there aren't any ghosts," mentioned Sheryl, "That's just a stupid…"

"I think we need to just find the tunnel, guys," I interrupted, "I, um…follow me." I snatched the flashlight from Zinnia and raced past the both of them, who noticed the nervousness of my behavior. They looked at each other with confused expressions for a couple of seconds, and then decided to follow me down the cold dark hallway.

Without saying a word, the three of us continued walking around the same floor for an additional ten minutes, and I was sure we past the same places five or six times. It seemed like we made less and less progress the more we searched. The place was starting to creep me out, more than usual.

I mindlessly wondered around with the blue flashlight held tightly in my hand, enclosed in the cold sweat progressing from my fingers. Escaping was apparently hard to do, especially when it came down to getting started with the plan. We even failed to come up with a plan, since we had not found the stupid tunnel yet.

CRASH!

"Oh my God, what was that!?" cried Zinnia, "Sheryl? Where's Sheryl!?"

I dropped the flashlight onto the floor. _She's back,_ I thought automatically.

"No, you can't take us alive, White Lady!" I cried, "I knew you couldn't be trusted. You're just a devil, a horrible, horrible devil!"

Zinnia turned to my outlined shadowy figure, "Okay…"

I invisibly blushed, "Nightmare."

CRASH!

"Help!" someone screamed.

"Sheryl!" Zinnia and I shouted in synchronization, not caring who else heard us.

The two of us rushed toward the location of the consistent screaming. It seemed like it was coming from the wall on our right, about twenty feet ahead. The screaming continued nonstop, but it eventually lowered in volume, as if it were leaving us – as if the screams were falling. Finally, the screams lessened to silence, but they still ringed in my head. They never really _stopped._

Zinnia ran back to grab the flashlight off the floor where I had left it. Unfortunately, I had broken it, but apparently, its services were no longer necessary. To top off the situation, all the lights in the hallway turned on, and Zinnia and I stared at the tall figure standing at the end of the hallway beside the light switch. It was Ms. A l'aide.

"Run, Zinnia!" I shouted the first words that came to mind. How did she find us? Oh right, the screaming.

I should have sucked up to her, dang it. I could have come up with an excuse to why we were out so late, and why we were out of our room. No, I had to run. Oh well, too late.

I ran in the opposite direction, somewhat glad that I could at least see where I was going. In an instant, I noticed a large hole in the wall ahead of me. It was the same size as a person, and I knew immediately that that's where Sheryl had gone. She had crashed and fallen through the brick wall. How on Earth…

"Zinnia, the hole! Jump down the hole!" Shouting my plans of escape with Ms A l'aide witnessing probably wasn't the best idea.

"You rotten BRATS!!!" exclaimed the distressed orphanage keeper as she attempted to chase after us in her slippery slippers on the hard tile floor. Distressed didn't even cover half of her feelings toward us. She _hated _us. I had never felt so much adrenaline running through my body in all my ten-year-old life. It felt good.

I saw Zinnia rush towards the large hole in the wall, not bothering to wonder why it was there in the first place. She reached the entrance to the hole, looked down, and looked back at me. She had a worried expression on her face, and I knew she was scared of how far down the hole went, and what was down there. I was just as, if not more, scared as Zinnia.

I felt someone grab my shoulder, and I turned around. "You aren't going anywhere," Ms. A l'aide said to me.

"Over my dead body!" I stepped on the end of her leopard print robe, and it slipped off her body to the ground, revealing a black bra and leopard print pajama pants. I laughed at her as she let go of my shoulder, leaned over in anguish, and screamed curtly. She crosses her arms over her chest while trying to pick up her robe.

"You're DEAD, Peters! You hear me? Dead!"

Before she could "kill me", I ran as fast as I could toward the hole while laughing my heart out. Zinnia was laughing as well. "Jump, Zin…Zinnia, jump!" I could not stop laughing at the wonderful parting moment. Finally, Zinnia jumped down the hole, and I followed behind her.

My laughter immediately faded into screaming as I fell down the dark, five-story-high hole. I completely realized my stupidity once I figured that I would fall right on top of Zinnia if we reached the bottom. The wind rushed upward and nearly flipped me over while blowing my hair away from my face.

I hadn't thought about Sheryl since she had fallen down the hole. What was at the bottom? It could have been a concrete sidewalk, a field, another floor, a tunnel…

I heard a loud _thud_ just before I hit the bottom, which would have been Zinnia. The loud _thud _sounded like impact with a dumpster full of garbage. How typical.

I landed headfirst on top of Zinnia, causing my head to bend backwards as the rest of my body followed. I kept my eyes shut, not daring to pear around at my surroundings. I heard nothing besides silence coming from the source of our fall. I waited to hear anything from Zinnia or Sheryl, which of course seemed hopeless in the meantime. Finally, I slowly opened my eyes.

Where _were _we?

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_I am SO sorry about the late update. Since NaNoWriMo ended, I've been procrastinating and putting this off. Anyway, check out . for my deviantART page, with more on Jackie Phantom, including some fanart. Please comment and let me know what you like and what you think I need to fix. Thanks a bunch! You're the best._

_~Nano_


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